SmackDown!
We got Bobby Lashley vs. JBL to start. Typical match, but the Boogeyman entrance started and that freaked JBL out so that he was distracted and didn’t notice that the Boogeyman had come from under the ring behind him, grabbing his ankle. With smoke all around the ring, Lashley grabbed JBL and gave him the Dominator. It reminded me of the old Exploding Ring matches from Japan where they’d have the finish after the big explosions. It was a memorable finish. They’ve given Jillian Hall a bandage over what used to be her mole.

Angle walked backstage and talked to all of the faces in the company and it was pretty good. They still managed to make him look heel-like and tough while having him greeting all the other good guys. Not an easy line to walk. Rey came and said he was gonna beat Mark Henry and they’d meet at the Rumble. If only that were true.

You may notice that this portion of the report is a little light. I watched the results show for Dancing With The Stars. It’s wrestling-related! Stacy was safe early on, which was a nice thing as she’s really good, though I thought her dance this time was pretty stiff. She’s gonna win it all if she’s not careful and it’s obvious that they’re building towards Drew Lachey vs. Stacy as the finals…or at least they’re trying to turn it that way.

Fit Finlay, one of my all-time faves, returned to face Matt Hardy. Matt was way over and Fit had lost a bit, but he still looked really tough in his match. Matt got the win by DQ when Fit was playing too rough. He then stomped Matt’s head on the steps for good measure. Nice way to reintroduce my man.

Rey Mysterio dragged a decent big man vs. little guy match out of Mark Henry. He’s got skills if he can pull that one off. He started fast and managed to send Henry to the outside and gave him a tope. He also did a bunch of Eddie mannerisms and the crowd chanted as they should. It’s nice to have Rey and Chavo to keep Eddie’s memory alive.

Oh, yeah, baby, right there!

Rey had offense and it was good. Mark Henry seemed to be trying, which is rare. He did the spot he eliminated Bobby Lashley with by suplexing him onto the top rope and then kicking him. Rey hit a bunch of 619s of various flavors. That led to Rey going to the top for the Frog Splash and the crowd chanting Eddy. Mark Henry took it, but at two sat up with Rey in his arms and gave him the powerslam. Nice finish. I’d say this was a match that was worth watching.

Ken Kennedy is awesome. He teased shooting a bunch of merch out to the fans. Then he said they could buy their own if they wanted it. He was wearing a suit with a tie and a Kennedy T-Shirt underneath. He then did commentary for Gymini vs. Kendrick and London. Fast match, and Gymini are good enough doing their power moves. I really liked the spot where they had London down on all fours like they were going for the assisted leg whip, but Gymini 1 caught Kendrick in air and tossed him onto London. I really like the double-team finisher where they do a cross-armed legsweep/flapjack-thingee. I’ll call it Gymini’s Twin.

For some reason, they had Orlando Jordan take on Randy Orton. OK, I know that they have the substitute angle, but really, I don’t care about this match. It won’t be bad, because Orton can go with just about anyone and Jordan is better than most give him credit for. Randy has been playing crafty young heel very well of late, and he did so here, too. There were some boring chants going on here, but it seemed to be from a select crew who I would likely be with if I were at the show.

Orlando took a rough bump when he went for a slingshot plancha and ended up belly-flopping onto the floor. Nice spot. You can’t say the guy doesn’t put out the effort. They had Orton complaining when the count was stopped over a foot under the ropes. Randy just worked him over a lot.

It wasn’t a bad match, itjust went too long, and the crowd was here and there into it. It’s the trouble of doing character who is viewed as heel against a character who is the lead heel. Meh. Benoit ran in and attacked the Booker Man. Nice ending that the crowd seemed into .